The afterglow of Martin Luther King Jr

The afterglow of Martin Luther King Jr. Day is marred by the ashes of his biography,
..
Martín Luther King: Contra todas las exclusions,
by Vincent Roussel

burned among the hundreds and very likely thousands of independent library books ordered incinerated by Cuban courts in April 2003. Other works describing King's tactics of civil disobedience have also been consigned to the flames.
.

Cuba

is one of the very few governments today that answers dissent
by turning ideas into ashes.
...

Dr. Steve Marquardt, Freadom Co-Chair, January 2007

After sentencing the independent librarians, Castro's judges, in a number of cases, declared the confiscated library materials "lacking in usefulness"
and ordered them burned.
...
Will the American Library Association hold a memorial service?.

Nat Hentoff, "The Abandoned Librarians" January 2004

Complete Documentation of More Titles and Items Ordered Burned, Here:

"Books Known to Have Been Burned In Cuba, in 2003"

The excerpts from the official sentencing documents below clearly show

what Cuban communists really think about Dr. King's ideas
of civil disobedience and peaceful dissent.

Here is the testimony of Gisela Delgado Sablon,
the Director of Cuba's Independent Library Project:

"In our homes, the homes of many of us who promote liberty and the defense of human rights in Cuba, books are frequently confiscated, hundreds of books that deal with human rights and with liberty. Among those books have been books about Martin Luther King Jr., the great American civic fighter who fought for the rights of blacks. This is contradictory, since in Cuba there exists a Martin Luther King center, and yet these books are regarded as dangerous to society.

...I have in my hands confiscation orders by Cuban customs, where they tell me that books sent to me from abroad have been confiscated because they are counterrevolutionary and because they threaten the interests of the Cuban nation...

...
How can a book threaten the nation
when it contains poetry, stories,
or the personal experiences, of its author?"

Here is the evidence from the court documents, which Cuban State Library officials deny exist,
but which are cited 73 times in Amnesty International's 2003 report, "Cuba: 'Essential measures'?"
and referenced 78 times in the Organization of American States "Report Nº 67/06" of 2006

LUIS MILAN FERNANDEZ, trial of 4 April 2003, from

http://www.ruleoflawandcuba.fsu.edu/documents-santiago-5e.cfm

"The albums and the remaining bibliographical, consisting of documents books, magazines and pamphlets, destrúyase by their little value …"

From the original court record:

"Los álbumes y los restantes documentos bibliográficos, consistentes en libros, revistas y folletos, destrúyase por su escaso valor …"

These included the following (machine translated):

"... material of studies received from the outside….from the United States, among them the book "Martin Luther King against all the exclusions" written by Vincent Roussel ...

Noticeable intentions to encourage to other citizens, doing public its pretension to motivate to a civil disobedience…. thus stimulating actions of civil disobedience by the internal counterrevolution and its ringleaders…… Director of a Training center, in which it distributed compatible courses, seminaries, conferences and other activities with the ideological bases…. that gave to the exercise of the Democracy and the observance of the Human rights ..."

LEONEL DE PERALTA ALMENARES, trial of 7 April 2003

"... carrying each one posters with contrarevolucionarias proclamations that they urge the civil disobedience…."

JULIO ANTONIO VALDES GUEVARA

"…accumulated, books, magazines, and printed pamphlets from counterrevolutionary authors….which exhort civil disobedience ..." [contents incinerated]

Trial of Julio Antonio Vales Guevara, in Santiago de Cuba, 5 April 2003. Case no. 5 of 2003.
Available at http://www.ruleoflawandcuba.fsu.edu/documents-santiago-6s.cfm

"… books, magazines, brochures and the rest of the documents to proceed to destruction by means of incineration for lacking utility; …"

From the original court record:

Se dispone que sobre el negativo fotográfico, el cassete de audio, las medicinas, los libros, revistas, folletos y el resto de los documentos procédase a su destrucción mediante incineración por carecer de utilidad; . . ."

VICTOR ROLANDO ARROYO CARMONA and FIDEL SUAREZ CRUZ, trial of 5 of April, 2003, Pinar del Rio

"... training for the civil disobedience in the pursuit of accomplishment of social disorder and destabilization of the country."

GUIDO SIGLER AMAYA, trial of April 5, 2003, Matanzas

"….exchanging….ideas in order to promote the civil disobedience… [contents incinerated]

Trial of Guido Sigler Amaya, in Matanzas, 5 April 2003 [Sentence number 9],

available at http://www.ruleoflawandcuba.fsu.edu/documents-matanzas-9e.cfm

"… the handwritten, typed, printed, signed and recorder [sic] documents which are also detailed in prior paragraphs … will be immediately destroyed by incineration."

DIOSDADO GONZALEZ MARRERO, trial of April 7th, 2003, Matanzas

"They also wrote an article stimulating the civil disobedience."

Source:

Sentencing Documents Charges

as derived from the Rule of Law and Cuba web site, at

http://www.ruleoflawandcuba.fsu.edu/

The Testimony of Norma Montero, an exiled Cuban librarian
who worked ten years at the Jose Marti National Library, in Havana.

The Comunist Party is afraid of books by authors like Martin L. King, George Orwell, Carlos Franqui and others. I think that the main reason is that these kinds of authors can open the minds of some people who only read what the government offers through bookstores or libraries.

Reading those authors, and others like Zoe Valdes, Cabrera Infante, etc., will give the people the opportunity to know other ideas and it will give them "doubts" about the Cuban dictatorship. So the books are "dangerous" to their minds; they dont want the people to think freely.

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From American Library Association Policies:

53.7 Destruction of Libraries
The American Library Association deplores the destruction of libraries, library collections and property, and the disruption of the educational process by that act, whether it be done by individuals or groups of individuals and whether it be in the name of honest dissent, the desire to control or limit thought or ideas, or for any other purpose.

53.1.12
The American Library Association believes that freedom of expression is an inalienable human right, necessary to self-government, vital to the resistance of oppression, and crucial to the cause of justice, and further, that the principles of freedom of expression should be applied by libraries and librarians throughout the world. Adopted 989.

ccccc	........................... FREADOM.	Photo: David Gonzalez (permission pending)
	Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Burned In Cuba A SPECIAL FREADOM REPORT January 2007 President Jimmy Carter gave this biography of Dr. King to show support for the independent libraries. This copy was confiscated by Castro's police, and in April 2003 a different copy was ordered burned by the Provincial Court of Santiago de Cuba. Read Senora Gisela Sablon's Statement of Support For the Read A Burned Book Project	Photo: David Gonzalez (permission pending)